Hence only those who held such benefices before the passing of the law now draw on the funds devoted to the maintenance of the Church; and they are dying off one by one, so that the time is fast approaching when there will not be a single Canon left who is salaried by the State.

In some dioceses these lapsed benefices are compensated for by the revenues from some religious foundation, or, as you may call it, a prebend.

But there are none at Chartres.

The Chapter has at the utmost the use of a varying income which it divides among those who have no benefice, giving them, good years with bad, a sum of about three hundred francs each, and that is all." "And the Canons have no perquisites ?" "None whatever." "Then I wonder how they live." "If they have no private fortune they live more penuriously than the poorest labourers in Chartres.

Most of them simply vegetate; some perform Mass for Sisterhoods, or are convent chaplains, but that brings in very little, two hundred or two hundred and fifty francs perhaps.
Another holds the post of secretary to the diocese, by which he gets rooms and as much, perhaps, as six hundred francs.